I knew Rocky put that spread together for her brother. It was likely she’d framed the other pictures for him too.

And it shook me that all he had, all that was him in his pad, was his father, his sister, his niece, and his sister’s extended family.

I was so deep in this thought, it surprised me to feel Merry’s heat at my back, his hand touch my waist, and his lips at my ear, saying, “Best day of my life.”

I stared at the photo, letting those words move through me, wanting to believe. Wanting to believe that was true and not that he felt that way about the day he’d married Mia.

“Finally, one Merrick had the guts to hang on to happy,” he finished.

I turned, and he lifted his head as he took that opportunity to trail his hand along my waist so it lay light on the small of my back.

“It’s cool your sister has that, Merry,” I told him, and his lips curled up.

“More than cool for her, babe.”

“Yeah, but best day of your life?” I pushed carefully.

He looked beyond me to the frame, then back to me as his left hand hit the other side of my waist.

“Lucky for me, I’m not dead yet.”

I lifted my hands and rested them on his chest, curling my lips up as well.

“Right about now, that’s lucky for me too.”

His grin got bigger but only for a moment before it faded.

“You okay, sweetheart?”

He was reading me.

I drew in a big breath before I shared, “Ethan’s at Meems’s. Weekday sleepover.”

His left hand slid to my back as his right one put pressure on.

My voice was weird, small, and trembling, as I admitted, “I’m givin’ up a morning. She’s gettin’ him to school.”

“You’re givin’ up a morning with your kid…for me.” He said that, and the way he said it, I knew he knew how big that was for me.

Then again, I’d already taught him that lesson the hard way.

“So I got my brown-eyed girl all night,” he murmured, his eyes falling to my mouth.

I slid a hand up to his neck and his eyes came back to mine.

With the movement of my hand, I meant to delay. I meant to get his attention. I meant to do this so I could say something.

But when he looked at me after the night he’d given me, and he’d already given me so much that I’d never had—taking me to a swish restaurant, telling me I looked phenomenal, kissing my hand in his truck, laying things out for me honestly, making me laugh, laughing with me—I couldn’t say what I needed to say. I couldn’t tell him how much this meant to me. I couldn’t tell him I was the kind of girl who’d never dreamed because, even when I was little, I always knew I was the kind of girl who’d be stupid to dream.